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David Foster Wallace’s final attempt to make art moral

newyorker.com

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Re: David Foster Wallace’s final attempt to make art moral

#71

Post by randycupertino »

themisto wrote: post #2

I haven't read any books by David Foster Wallace, though every time he comes up I feel obliged to share a fantastic speech of his about finding joy in the monotony of life. I heard it years ago and it's always stuck with me. Video[1], transcript[2] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CrOL-ydFMI [2] https://jamesclear.com/great-speeches/this-is-water-by-david...

I love his cruise ship essay.

He's such a smug intellectual brat HOWEVER he's fully self-aware of his personality shortcomings and seems to set his qualms and enjoy himself despite of himself by the end.

https://harpers.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/HarpersMagazi...

Re: David Foster Wallace’s final attempt to make art moral

#72

Post by [deleted] »

CTmystery wrote: post #41

Reading this makes me feel quite insecure in my own comprehension of these books. I've read Pale King, Infinite Jest, Consider the Lobster, and Broom of the System. I liked them all. But I read this article and I don't really understand the majority of it, which makes me think that I also missed a lot of what I was supposed to take from the books. Genuine question, does this make sense to most readers? Do you need to…

[deleted]

Re: David Foster Wallace’s final attempt to make art moral

#73

Post by npilk »

rintakumpu wrote: post #9
npilk wrote: post #3

Though unfinished, I highly recommend the Pale King. It's not as consistently great as some of DFW's other works, but the highs are as high as anything else he wrote and IMO it's a little more accessible than Infinite Jest. (For a new reader, I would start with some of his essays, e.g. Consider the Lobster: http://www.columbia.edu/~col8/lobsterarticle.pdf )

The first time I read Infinite Jest I was expecting something as inaccessible as Ulysses or Gravity’s Rainbow but ended up finding the book pretty readable and a total delight. And but so I would highly recommend it, just take the off-beat sci-fi setting at face value and skip the footnotes if you feel like you want to focus on the story. You can always return to those later.

That’s fair. I ended up sort of skimming through it the first time reading the parts I could connect with and then picked up more of the detail (and the end notes) on later re-readings. For The Pale King, I was able to read it in depth from the jump. But that may also be because I was more mature and had read DFW before…

Re: David Foster Wallace’s final attempt to make art moral

#74

Post by syndacks »

rintakumpu wrote: post #9
npilk wrote: post #3

Though unfinished, I highly recommend the Pale King. It's not as consistently great as some of DFW's other works, but the highs are as high as anything else he wrote and IMO it's a little more accessible than Infinite Jest. (For a new reader, I would start with some of his essays, e.g. Consider the Lobster: http://www.columbia.edu/~col8/lobsterarticle.pdf )

The first time I read Infinite Jest I was expecting something as inaccessible as Ulysses or Gravity’s Rainbow but ended up finding the book pretty readable and a total delight. And but so I would highly recommend it, just take the off-beat sci-fi setting at face value and skip the footnotes if you feel like you want to focus on the story. You can always return to those later.

Infinite Jest reads like See Spot Run compared to Gravity’s Rainbow.

Re: David Foster Wallace’s final attempt to make art moral

#75

Post by sorrychuck »

Arubis wrote: post #62
Invictus0 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get how people can care about things like this. The American Constitution was written by slaveowners, and MLK cheated on his wife. It doesn't make the Constitution worthless nor does it make the I have a Dream speech a fraud. Never meet your heroes.

Nuance! You can do better than black and white, good/bad binary decisions. I totally care about those other factors. And I am acutely aware of the effect that physical abuse has on real, actual people. It's unavoidable that this would effect my reading of someone's work. That the writers of the Constitution were morally fallible means they weren't the final authority, and we should be willing to grow. They had wisdom…

Hanging hard onto the myth lol.

The good he did is enough. One doesn’t have to be perfect for one's works to be good.

Re: David Foster Wallace’s final attempt to make art moral

#76

Post by everybodyknows »

Arubis wrote: post #8

I wish I could still love DFW's work the way I used to, but it's colored by [allegations of significant relational abuse]( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Foster_Wallace#Personal_... ).

His more serious journalistic pieces can be read without much reflection on the man himself.

On the politics of language:

http://harpers.org/wp-content/uploads/HarpersMagazine-2001-0...

Re: David Foster Wallace’s final attempt to make art moral

#77

Post by everybodyknows »

redtexture wrote: post #33
Arubis wrote: post #8

I wish I could still love DFW's work the way I used to, but it's colored by [allegations of significant relational abuse]( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Foster_Wallace#Personal_... ).

From the article. > Subsequent first-person accounts came from Wallace’s friends... >...They also produced a fairly consistent picture of a selfish friend, a manipulative—and likely abusive—boyfriend, and a jealous and self-mythologizing writer. Even were we to desire to do so, there is no way to read Wallace today without knowing these things about him. > It’s worth noting, though, that for attentive readers of Wall…

> cringeworthy sentimentalism

This is new to me -- anyone have an example?

Re: David Foster Wallace’s final attempt to make art moral

#78

Post by dizhn »

rintakumpu wrote: post #9
npilk wrote: post #3

Though unfinished, I highly recommend the Pale King. It's not as consistently great as some of DFW's other works, but the highs are as high as anything else he wrote and IMO it's a little more accessible than Infinite Jest. (For a new reader, I would start with some of his essays, e.g. Consider the Lobster: http://www.columbia.edu/~col8/lobsterarticle.pdf )

The first time I read Infinite Jest I was expecting something as inaccessible as Ulysses or Gravity’s Rainbow but ended up finding the book pretty readable and a total delight. And but so I would highly recommend it, just take the off-beat sci-fi setting at face value and skip the footnotes if you feel like you want to focus on the story. You can always return to those later.

"And but so"

If you write like this yourself it's no wonder you'd find it readable. Or in other words I see what you did there.

Re: David Foster Wallace’s final attempt to make art moral

#79

Post by cantSpellSober »

npilk wrote: post #3

Though unfinished, I highly recommend the Pale King. It's not as consistently great as some of DFW's other works, but the highs are as high as anything else he wrote and IMO it's a little more accessible than Infinite Jest. (For a new reader, I would start with some of his essays, e.g. Consider the Lobster: http://www.columbia.edu/~col8/lobsterarticle.pdf )

And if you've read The Pale King, you can skip Something To Do With Paying Attention.

The content is mostly the same, seems like the release of the latter was a cash grab.

Re: David Foster Wallace’s final attempt to make art moral

#80

Post by boppo1 »

Arubis wrote: post #8

I wish I could still love DFW's work the way I used to, but it's colored by [allegations of significant relational abuse]( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Foster_Wallace#Personal_... ).

I mean, he knew he was a piece of shit and killed himself. Sort of an ultimate mea culpa. So maybe we can forgive him enough to enjoy his works.
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